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America's Mental Illness Epidemic: It Turns Out That the Drugs Are the Problem

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BridgeTheGap Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 04:32 PM
Original message
America's Mental Illness Epidemic: It Turns Out That the Drugs Are the Problem
Tens of millions of innocent, unsuspecting Americans, who are mired deeply in the mental "health" system, have actually been made crazy by the use of or the withdrawal from commonly-prescribed, brain-altering, brain-disabling, indeed brain-damaging psychiatric drugs that have been, for many decades, cavalierly handed out like candy -- often in untested and therefore unapproved combinations of drugs -- to trusting and unaware patients by equally unaware but well-intentioned physicians who have been under the mesmerizing influence of slick and obscenely profitable psychopharmaceutical drug companies, a.k.a. BigPharma.

That is the conclusion of two books by investigative journalist and health science writer Robert Whitaker. His first book, entitled Mad in America: Bad Science, Bad Medicine and the Enduring Mistreatment of the Mentally Ill noted that there has been a 600 percent increase (since Thorazine was introduced in the US in the mid-1950s) in the total and permanent disabilities of millions of psychiatric drug-takers. This uniquely First World mental ill health epidemic has resulted in the life-long taxpayer-supported disabilities of rapidly increasing numbers of psychiatric patients who are now unable to be happy, productive, taxpaying members of society.

Whitaker has done a powerful, albeit unwelcome job of presenting previously hidden, but very convincing evidence to support his thesis, that it is the drugs and not the diagnosis that is causing the epidemic of mental illness disability. Many open-minded physicians and many aware psychiatric patients are now motivated to be wary of any and all synthetic chemicals that can cross the blood/brain barrier because all of them are capable of altering the brain in ways totally unknown to medical science, especially when the patients are taking the drugs long-term. .

In Whitaker's second book Anatomy of an Epidemic: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs, and the Astonishing Rise of Mental Illness in America, he goes much further in advancing this sobering reality. He documents the history of the powerful forces behind the relatively new field of psychopharmacology and its major shaper and beneficiary, BigPharma. Psychiatric drugs, whose developers, marketers and salespersons are all in the employ of the giant drug companies, are far more dangerous than the drug and psychiatric industries are willing to admit: These drugs, it turns our, are fully capable of disabling -- often permanently -- body, brain and spirit.

http://www.sott.net/articles/show/214351-America-s-Mental-Illness-Epidemic-It-Turns-Out-That-the-Drugs-Are-the-Problem
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left coaster Donating Member (938 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 04:39 PM
Response to Original message
1. But the Pharma industry has made millions and millions, and that's all that matters..
Right??? :sarcasm:



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tabatha Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 04:42 PM
Response to Reply #1
3. And it is "science based medicine"
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Voice for Peace Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 06:13 PM
Response to Reply #3
16. yup. nt
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HuckleB Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 11:10 PM
Response to Reply #3
22. Thank you for confessing!
:rofl:
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Warpy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 04:40 PM
Response to Original message
2. Already done to death.
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Mimosa Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 04:45 PM
Response to Reply #2
5. Some of us may have not seen it.
I appreciate this topic. If you don't why not just ignore it?
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WhiteTara Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 05:02 PM
Response to Reply #5
9. cause it was already done to death
but I agree, I should have just ignored it. But then, I might be mentally ill :rofl:
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Mimosa Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 07:49 PM
Response to Reply #9
17. Anybody with consciousness these days must be crazy!
*hug*
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WhiteTara Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 08:05 PM
Response to Reply #17
19. right back at you!
:hug:
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groovedaddy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 05:37 PM
Response to Reply #2
11. I haven't seen this. n.t
Edited on Tue Sep-07-10 05:38 PM by groovedaddy
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HuckleB Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 09:31 PM
Response to Reply #2
20. But we must spread disinformation far and wide!
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mopinko Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Sep-09-10 08:10 AM
Response to Reply #2
28. if you don't beat these dead horses regularly, they might,
you know, die.
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RandomThoughts Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 04:45 PM
Response to Original message
4. Win one for Tom Cruise. Tom Cruise was smeared when he commented on Phrama buisness.
Edited on Tue Sep-07-10 04:58 PM by RandomThoughts
On a side note, looking at some movie clips of him.
It says in this comment he can play pool, if he is ever near where I am, I will play him a set or two. When I get money of coarse.
Color of money.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrjSqK7xPLE

You can see in his one handed shot in this clip, he uses a backstroke.

In a one handed shot, you have no back stroke, like the swing of a overhead strike from a staff.

Notice in his one handed shot in this clip, he backstrokes a bit, in one handed shooting, you just push forward after lining up, since when without a bridge, a back stroke distorts accuracy.

Although his forward stroke is pretty good with a bridge, smooth with good follow through.

And I don't think of green as money, but understand that sides thoughts on that.

A minor point, by spreading his two smaller fingers on bridge hand could add some stability also.

Just by watching his form, I could beat him at pool, although he is probably a better actor then me.


I do like the guy though :) Think he has a good heart, but just my view from watching on tv interviews.

Risky Business Dance Scene
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2UVsyVLLcE
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HuckleB Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 09:31 PM
Response to Reply #4
21. This piece is almost as ludicrous as Tom Cruise's baseless rants.
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OffWithTheirHeads Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 04:48 PM
Response to Original message
6. From what I can see the real problem with thr red neck right is Meth.
nt
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Fumesucker Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 04:49 PM
Response to Reply #6
7. Actually alcohol is far more popular..
And kills far more than all illegal drugs combined..
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TlalocW Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 04:56 PM
Response to Original message
8. Modern Pharmacy scares me
So many medicines have come on the market for things I didn't know were problems - who knows, maybe there are tons of people who suffer from the ailments these drugs are supposed to cure, but to me, "Restless Leg Syndrome," sounds more benign than the long list of side-effects that are rattled off at super-speed and in a hushed whisper toward the end of the commercial extolling the medicine that is supposed to get rid of it.

TlalocW
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RaleighNCDUer Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 05:03 PM
Response to Reply #8
10. And of course, the medicine they prescribe will, as with nearly all
other maladies, treat the symptoms without touching on the CAUSE of the problem, thus guaranteeing a long, indefinite, possibly permanent income flow for the pharma company. God forbid somebody actually CURES something. Symptom maintenance is SO much more profitable.
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undergroundpanther Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 07:57 PM
Response to Reply #8
18. Restless leg syndrome
Reminds me of a side effect of several psych drugs,
Akathisia,where you cannot relax and must move your legs..


Akathisia (Greek “not to sit”) is an extrapyramidal movement disorder consisting of difficulty in staying still and a subjective sense of restlessness. It is a recognised side effect of antipsychotic and antiemetic drugs but may also be caused by other widely prescribed drugs such as antidepressants. It is a difficult condition to detect reliably and may present unexpectedly in a variety of clinical settings. The patient's behaviour may be disturbed, treatment may be refused, or the patient may be suicidal and be mistaken for a psychiatric problem. We report three cases seen in the psycho-oncology service which improved when the offending drug was discontinued.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1123446/
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Better Today Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 05:40 PM
Response to Original message
12. I've been saying this for years. Even refused to allow my children
who are both geniuses being born of two genius parents who also each had at least one genius parent. But in our families, there is also a high rate of social fallibility and high temper etc. Numerous times I was told to get my son medicated by school officials, but I refused. Now I was a stay at home Mom so I was able to "teach" him out of his temper. It was a childhood long commitment, constantly making sure to help his intelligence over rule his emotions. Catch phrases like, "who ever loses their temper is the loser, remember that." And being willing to accept that when I lost my temper (yes, he inherited it, but through helping him, I also helped myself), anyway when I lost my temper, I got pegged a loser as well, never had a double standard. My daughter was more socially adept until late jr. high when she went into a severe depression. Again I was advised to put her on pills, but instead I beat her with a stick. . . no really, the stick only touched her once, but I would've kept hitting if necessary.

Long story short, she wouldn't get out of her room, wouldn't talk to her friends, nothing, for about three months. So I dragged her out of her bed, shoved her out the front door with a $20 and told her to go do something, ANYTHING, but don't come back till she had done something for herself. She wouldn't go so I picked up a stick and hit her. She came back a few hours later after having coffee at the local coffee house and had a good time. Once she realized that she wasn't going to get the normal treatment for depression, she was more agreeable to locating the cause of the depression.

Guess what it was, . . . you'll never guess, but if you are a parent you need to hear. It was a constant diet of one or two musicians, Heather Nova and (oops, I can't remember the other one but he sang a lot about suicide and how the world sucks). We tested out the idea by putting her on restriction from those artists for about a month and she's been fine ever since. She still listens to those and similar artists, but she's learned not to have steady diet of such songs.

Anyway, I am glad for my children that I am such and obstinate, bitchy, hard-nosed, unbeliever when it comes to modern medicine. I have no doubt that my children are much better and much safer than they would have been had we gotten roped into the crap most of their friends went (and are still going into their middle 20s) through. Many of them are now on multiple mental pills per day, disgusting, and since they lose their effectiveness over time, I would guess that it will only get worse as they age.

For me, well, I've accepted myself with mental illness. Due to severe child abuse, like broken and bleeding child abuse, I have a mental condition which was misdiagnosed many times, but I only agreed to take pills once. Within a week I flushed them, I couldn't stand the whole zombie thing. Now that my daughter is in the social working arena, we've finally gotten to a legitimate diagnosis with both of us trying really hard in the past six months to research this (the years of unemployment and stagnant biz have made some of my "problems" more invasive than when I was busy and busy and busy). Anyway, once we figured out my accurate diagnosis, turns out there's no pill that will help anyway. So I'm screwed, but not so much that I couldn't make sure my children could grow up to be drug free (okay they sometimes partake in pot, but no pharmas).

Actually now that I think about it, it's probably a side effect of my mental problems that I didn't let my kids get medicated. One of the primary symptoms of my disorder is refusal to trust or even respect authority figures, and for some reason that I cannot fathom, most Americans think that doctors are authority figures. They all seem too befuddled to realize that their bodies and minds are their own, and that they need to be in charge. Doctors used to dump me regularly because I would be sure to remind them that they work for me, they don't rule me, therefore their concerns and advice were informational, not directives. Docs don't like it when you won't submit to them. Due to that, I've not seen a doc for anything, not a cold, not a blown out knee, not a nail through my foot, not when I contracted MRSA, nothing, since 1991, and I rue the day I may actually have to have help. My children do see doctors, but they know to keep them in line and to make their own decisions.

Wow, when I started this post, I was just going to type about a sentence. I guess I needed to release this, thanks for "listening."

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glitch Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 05:55 PM
Response to Reply #12
13. Distrusting authority is not a mental illness, or if it is then I have it to! nt
:hi:
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Better Today Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 05:59 PM
Response to Reply #13
14. I said a primary symptom, but not the only one. And just having
distrust isn't a symptom per se, it's how I handle that mistrust that causes the problems.
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Celebration Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Sep-08-10 07:57 PM
Response to Reply #12
27. I listened, thanks n/t
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marybourg Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 06:03 PM
Response to Original message
15. Yeh. an' them vaccine things, too. What rot! There were hundreds of thousands
of mentally ill people locked up in enormous mental hospitals in filthy degrading conditions before the advent of psychiatric dugs. Look up the name "Willowbrook" Look up "Pilgrim State". Too many here think that history started when they were born.
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HuckleB Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Sep-07-10 11:13 PM
Response to Reply #15
23. +1,000,000,000,000,000,000 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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Mimosa Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Sep-08-10 10:15 AM
Response to Reply #15
24. A lot of people are crazy and stay in their homes on Diability
Have you ever watch 'Hoarders'? All those people are terribly mentally ill.
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marybourg Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Sep-08-10 10:58 AM
Response to Reply #24
25. And a lot of them can be helped by meds. nt.
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Duer 157099 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Sep-08-10 03:27 PM
Response to Original message
26. Thanks for posting. Just downloaded the audiobook
Not looking forward to "reading" it but I will anyway. :thumbsup:
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